COMMUNITIES and villages in Renbel, Western-Shortland Islands, Temotu and Malaita Provinces have been commended for their support demonstrated towards the success of the national Village Resource Survey (VRS) and Household Listing 2017-2018 initial phase in 2017.
The survey was conducted under the responsibility of Solomon Islands National Statistics Office (SINSO).
Government Statisticians (GS) Douglas Kimi in a statement this week has commended the communities for their help in ensuring the survey has been completed.
The VRS 2017-2018 is a nationwide survey and it is the basis for the national census count in 2019.
The survey (VRS 2017-18) first phase was effectively conducted in the last quarter of 2017 with 18 wards being enumerated.
The 18 wards enumerated were;
• Ward 1 and 2 in the Shortland Islands, Western Province. (Whole of Shortland Islands).
• Ward 1 to 10 in Renbel Province. (Whole of Renbel Province).
• Ward 8, 9, 13 and 14 in Temotu Province and
• Ward 2 and 30 in Malaita Province.
While commending people, villages and organisations that have cooperated with the SINSO towards enumerating these 18 wards, Mr. Kimi said the support and cooperation of the people, villages/communities and organisations towards the SINSO and enumerators during the course of the first phase is overwhelming and that has been proved with the positive outcome of the project (VRS 2017-18) initial phase.
He said that as the SINSO is now preparing to carry-out the second phase of the project this month such cooperation and support must be continued to ensure its success.
Mr. Kimi calls on villages/communities that the second phase will be conducted this month (January) to cooperate with enumerators and provide them with correct information.
The Government Statistician also acknowledged the VRS Project Director Raphael Aipaina, VRS staff and enumerators for their dedication and hard work towards the end of 2017.
He also thanked the National Government (SIG) through the Ministry of Finance and Treasury (MoFT) for the funding support provided in ensuring SINSO rolling out the initial phase last year.
Mr Kimi reiterated that the VRS 2017-2018 and Listing operations are also key prerequisite operations critical for the preparation of the forthcoming 2019 Population and Housing Census.
“The success and quality of the 2019 Census will also depend on the successful updating of all village records and households in the country,” he said.
Meanwhile, VRS 2017-18 Project Director Raphael Aipaina said the second phase will cover Choiseul, Central Island and Makira Provinces and will go on for two month.
He said phase three which is earmarked for Western, whole of Malaita, Guadalcanal and Honiara will be followed after the completion of the second phase.
Mr Aipaina added that the second phase was supposed to be conducted end of last year, but, due to the revision of the initial plan it was delayed for this year-2018 to overlap with the last phase which is the 3rd segment. “Remaining wards in Temotu Province from the first phase will be enumerated in the second phase.”
The Solomon Islands Government (SIG) through the Ministry of Finance & Treasury is funding the VRS 2017/18 project.
The Village Resource Survey (VRS) has a long history in the Solomon Islands National Statistics Office (SINSO). Initiated in the 1980’s, it was then conducted in 1995-1996, then in 2007- 2008 but due to resource constraints the results were only used internally in preparation of the past censuses; the present VRS 2017-2018 is the fourth one in the series.
The VRS will collect information on services to the village and will include mapping.
The household listing exercise will collect information on the location of households by GPS and the number of people per household by gender. This is the basis for Census enumeration areas (EA) demarcation.
The VRS 2017-2018 will play the role of assisting the SIG in providing quality data at the village level, which is essential, to see the impact of development, and guide its development efforts and policy – makers in the future, to improve the livelihood and standard of living for all Solomon Islanders.
Source: SINSO Media
